


Fall Together

by still_lycoris



Category: Death Note (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Anger, Comfort Sex, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Past Character Death, Past Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-04
Updated: 2019-01-04
Packaged: 2019-10-04 10:05:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17302619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/still_lycoris/pseuds/still_lycoris
Summary: A year on and Matsuda still hasn't recovered. It looks like Ide hasn't either ...





	Fall Together

If it hadn’t been for working with Near, Matsuda thought the anniversary might not have been so bad (or at least, might have gone by with only some misery.) But it was and the case went well but because it was Near, it wasn’t like there was anything to be pleased about. Just another thing that Near had done, another thing that would make everyone think that he was brilliant when he was just a _cheat_ , a stupid _cheat_ ...

To his slight surprise, Ide looked kind of depressed as well. Which was a bit weird, since Ide had been the one who’d been all pushy earlier about him pulling himself together and stuff. Maybe it was just the difference between talking about it and going to the stupid place, being near it again (remembering Light on the floor, Aizawa stopping him going to him and he should have shoved Aizawa aside, sat with Light, held his hand, he should have done something else, he should have – ) 

When Ide muttered that he was going home, Matsuda followed, saying that he’d had enough. Ide looked at him for a long moment once they were outside and then shrugged and said “You really had enough or do you want to come back to mine?” and Matsuda had never seen Ide’s place so he said yes.

Ide’s place was kind of what he’d expected. Extremely tidy. All dull colours and nothing funny or goofy around the place. Matsuda sort of wanted to joke about it but he looked at Ide’s face and decided not to. Ide still looked weird, like he was sad about something and Matsuda wasn’t really used to seeing Ide sad. Ide hadn’t even looked sad after the Yellowbox warehouse after the first time. He’d gone super-practical, like it was just another day. Like someone hadn’t just died in front of them and like they hadn’t nearly been murdered by their friend and like it hadn’t been a nightmare ...

He didn’t want to think about that so he took another drink. Ide had more beer than he would have expected. Not bad stuff really. 

It was weird drinking in silence. It made him feel uncomfortable, so after a while, he prodded Ide with his foot.

“So what’s up with you then? Thought you’d want to celebrate.”

“We are celebrating,” Ide said flatly. “We’re drinking, aren’t we? Isn’t that celebrating?”

“No,” Matsuda said and he felt a bit happier because this was normal, this was squabbling with Ide about how little Ide knew about anything like romance or fun. “This isn’t celebrating. You didn’t even put the lights on properly so now it’s all dark. This is just drinking. It’s about as close to celebrating as you’ve ever got to romance.”

“Oh shut up!” Ide snapped. “What is your _obsession_ with that? It’s not like it’s done you any good!”

“I ... fine then. This still isn’t celebrating. It’s more like ... being depressed.”

“Well, maybe I am depressed!”

Matsuda paused uncertainly. Ide wasn’t supposed to be depressed. What did Ide have to be depressed about. He was fine, wasn’t he? He was always fine. Or at least, he always seemed to be fine. Everybody did. It was so frustrating sometimes, watching other people be better at everything than he was. Ide never seemed to mess up or annoy people or do anything that got people to call him stupid. Why would he be depressed?

“Fuck,” Ide muttered and slumped back on the couch. “Forget it.”

“No. No, it ... are you okay?”

It seemed a bit stupid to say it and he expected Ide to say that only Ide didn’t. He closed his eyes instead and gripped the bottle tightly between his hands, twisting it slightly.

“Going back to that place ... I tried to forget it. All of it. And you were so messed up after, made it easy because I had something to do.”

Matsuda wanted to protest at that, say that it hadn’t been like that, only it had of course, so he couldn’t. He had been messed up after. He didn’t think he’d _stopped_ being messed up, only it was easier to hide now. Easier to put the face on that you were supposed to wear and tidy up all the horrible feelings inside the way that people were meant to. He sort of hoped that if he did it long enough, all the horrible feelings would just go away and he wouldn’t feel them any more. It hadn’t worked yet but maybe soon ...

“And then we were back at work and crime was getting up ... I don’t know. Thought I’d just forget. But I didn’t and now ... fuck’s sake.”

“What’s bothering you?” Matsuda asked. “You didn’t even like Light that much.”

“We were sleeping together.”

Ide said it really flatly, like there wasn’t really anything else to say. Matsuda felt a breath catch in his throat and it stopped him speaking. He stared at Ide, words chasing themselves around his brain. Ide was drunk and crazy. Ide was making this up for some reason. Beautiful people like Light didn’t sleep with people like Ide. They just didn’t. Anyway, Light had girlfriends, beautiful girlfriends, because beautiful people belonged together, didn’t they, that was how it worked and Ide ... wasn’t beautiful. He was Ide, that was all. Just Ide.

Ide didn’t seem to have noticed that Matsuda wasn’t talking any more. He wasn’t looking at Matsuda. He was still staring at the ceiling, as though there was something there that would do something, make this better.

“It was so messed up,” he said, sounding quite calm. “I didn’t think it was at the time. Isn’t that stupid? It should have been messed up from the start. He was younger than me and living with a girlfriend and ... but I don’t know. I don’t know. That’s what you’re supposed to do, isn’t it? You make sure that everybody knows that you’re normal and then you just get on with what you need. Light always seemed so confident, I suppose. He always knew what he wanted and he’d get on with it. I thought I seduced him but it was probably the other way around because, well. You can’t trust anything, anything he ever said, all fucking lies. But God, he was beautiful, wasn’t he? Was I supposed to resist that, really? And I thought he ... he was all right. I thought he was just a co-worker. A very smart co-worker who liked me to get on my knees from time to time.”

The calm vanished in the last sentence. He sounded almost vicious and he put his bottle to his mouth, gulped back the last bit of his drink as though he wanted to drown any more words. Matsuda didn’t know what to say. Everything felt stuck inside him. The horrible thing was, he could picture it, with everything he knew now. If Ide was right and Light had just wanted to get things his way, it would have been easy for him to manipulate any of them into bed.

Matsuda would have done it.

He had to gulp from his own bottle to keep that in. Light had been beautiful. Beautiful and lovely and kind (only that part was the lie, wasn’t it, lovely and kind, murderers who lied to their father weren’t lovely and kind.) And he’d obviously used that beauty and kindness and why did it have to be like that? Why couldn’t Light just have been the person Matsuda wanted him to be?

He realised that he’d just been sitting in silence, staring at Ide and it had to look weird. Ide had closed his eyes now and there was a little glitter beneath his eye, almost as though he was thinking about crying.

“Ide – ”

“I’m going to bed,” Ide said flatly, standing up with a jerk. “You can sleep on the couch if you want. Or go home. I don’t mind.”

He walked away, closing the door with a sharp click. Matsuda stared after him. He should have said something. Why hadn’t he said something? Now Ide probably thought that he hated him or was freaked out or something and he wasn’t, he really wasn’t, he didn’t care, except that it was unfair because Ide was his friend and Light had hurt him, hadn’t he? Light had hurt somebody _again_.

When would it stop hurting?

He cleaned up the bottles because it was something he could do, even though his head was beginning to spin a bit, then curled up on the couch because the idea of going anywhere was just depressing. He kept hearing Ide in his head, over and over; _A very smart co-worker who liked me to get on my knees from time to time_.

It had probably hadn’t been quite as bad as it sounded, right? Just, Ide was sad and angry now and everything was dirty because Light hadn’t been the man than they’d thought. 

It hadn’t been fair. None of it had been fair. None of it was ever going to be fair again, was it?

He half-dozed. It was cold in the apartment and he felt cold inside too. All the bad things that he could keep away in the day were there now, mixed up with everything Ide had said. Everything was fucked up. Why did it all have to be so fucked up? He wanted to sleep and he couldn’t because it was cold and sad.

He got up and headed to Ide’s room, opening the door. Ide was curled up in bed, tight, in a knot. Matsuda moved over and got into the bed.

“What are you doing?” Ide muttered and he didn’t even sound sleepy, it was like he’d been lying awake and maybe he had.

“It’s cold out there.”

He moved closer, put his face against the back of Ide’s neck. Ide didn’t say anything. He leaned back, letting Masuda burrow against him, clearly quite happy to pretend that it was because Matsuda was cold and he needed warming up, nothing else, not that they needed to cling together because everything was so fucked up.

Matsuda dozed again. Ide smelt good, liked washed sheets. He did feel warmer now and it was okay. It wasn’t so awful. At some point, he woke up and they were holding hands and that was kind of nice too.

Then next time he woke up, Ide had rolled over so they were facing each other and when he saw Matsuda’s eyes open, he kissed him, hard and yet sort of uncertain at the same time, like he thought that Matsuda might shove him off and tell him not to do it.

Matsuda didn’t say it. Matsuda kissed him back and ran his hands through Ide’s hair and pressed tight against him, liking the feel of it. He leaned in, whispered “Let me show you something, okay?” and Ide nodded and put his hands back when Matsuda told him to and then he lay there, as still as he could manage as Matsuda moved over his whole body, touching and kissing and feeling him until he thought Ide couldn’t stand it any more.

 _This is what is should be like, do you see? This is how it’s meant to be_.

Ide burrowed against him afterwards and went to sleep almost immediately. Matsuda lay awake for a little while longer. He knew that Ide would be gruff and awkward in the morning but he didn’t think Ide would push him away. He thought that maybe, they’d managed to find something, something a bit better. Something to hope for.

But he was tired and finally warm and Ide felt nice and it was something that he could think about in the morning.

Matusda curled up and finally, went properly to sleep.


End file.
